Gays and Lesbians
in Oak Park - A Progress Report - June 20, 2000

Note - This
is a work-in-progress and represents my knowledge and thinking
in June, 2000. I had originally written this report in January
and circulate it along with the other progreee reports for comments.
I got back the most response to this section in terms of corrections
and disgreements. As I felt the need to make some modifications
and clarifications, this preliminary report will undoubtedly
be in a continual state of revision. It is made available for
comment, criticism, correction and suggestions.Email
me.

Like all communities,
Oak Park has always had people whose sexual preference was for
people of the same sex. They were simply silent about their preferences.
An exit poll taken in 1996 in New York reported in the New York
Times discovered that 5 percent of the voters were willing to
state to the strangers taking the poll that they were gay or lesbian.
Other estimates range from ten to one per cent. Whatever the percentage,
gays and lesbians have become a public part of U.S. society and
a major political, economic and social force in Oak Park. Some
have suggested that gay and lesbian civil rights issues such as
the expansion of anti-discrimination laws to include sexual preference,
the legalization of gay and lesbian marriage together with the
expansion of all spousal rights, liberalizing school curriculum
to include a discussion of the gay and lesbian life in non-pathological
ways, the expansion easing of adoption laws to include same sex
partners will be the major civil rights issue of the new century.
People opposed to these rights see them as part of what is called
"The Gay Agenda" and regard these changes not as civil
rights issues but as the undermining of the moral fiber of the
U.S. I intend to focus a large part of my research on the gay
and lesbian community in Oak Park. I believe that my interest
in how Oak Park maintains itself as a diverse and tolerant community
can be richly illuminated with an ethnographic study of gays and
lesbian. I hope in this brief essay to explain why and what I
have learned so far. At the present time (Jume 21, 2000), I am
exploring the possibility of making a videotape of a gay couple
with children as a way of getting at some of the issues I wish
to explore. While one video could never represent the whole of
the gay and lesbian community it will provide some insights into
what I am beginning to call the "Oak Park Experiment"
in diversity.

While the Stonewall
Riot in the late 1960s is usually regarded as the beginning of
a public gay male lifestyle or sub-culture, the stirring of such
a movement can be found much earlier particularly with emergence
of a gay and lesbian press immediately after World War II. Stonewall
simply caught the attention of the mainstream press and the public
in general. Consequently, many people came out in the 1970s, that
is, admitted their sexual orientation. They ceased being homosexuals
deeply closeted for fear of the consequences and became gay people
celebrating their sexuality and demanding equal rights and equal
protection under the law. Initially the public gay life was predominately
male. A lesbian sub-culture recognized by the public appeared
a bit later as chronicled in Lindsy Van Gelder and Pamela Robin
Brandt's The Girls Next Door (1996 Simon & Schuster).

There is some debate
within the gay and lesbian community about how different gays
and lesbians should be from the straight world. At one end of
the argument is Bruce Bawer who argues that once gays and lesbians
have equal rights, sexual orientation will simply be like ethnic
or religious identity. There will be no need for a subculture.

"Gays exist as
a group, then, largely because there is anti-gay prejudice. If
gay relationships were taken for granted by everyone and accorded
the same legal and moral status as heterosexual marriages, and
if gay children were educated to be as comfortable with their
sexuality as straight children and given courtship rituals comparable
to those of straight children, much of what we think of as the
"gay subculture" would disappear. Individual gays would
still gravitate to each other because of sexual or romantic attraction,
but there would be nothing to bind homosexuals together en masse
in gay bars or restaurants, gay churches or synagogues, or Gay
Studies programs. It is precisely because anti-gay prejudice
does exist that some gays, in the interest of self-protection,
plunge into the gay subculture, cling to their sexual identity,
and (in some cases) accordingly become preoccupied with sex."
(from Bawer, Bruce, A Place at the Table: The Gay Individual
in American Society. New York: Poseidon Press. 1993 pg. 86)

Bawer is at the extreme
end of what might be characterized as the assimilation debate.
Queer theorists as can be read in Brett Beemyn's and Mickey Eliason's
1996 book, Queer studies : a lesbian, gay, bisexual, &
transgender anthology (New York: New York University) make
the opposite argument. They celebrate the differences between
the straight and gay/lesbian worlds and work to maintain those
differences. Just to complicate matter, an article
by Cindy Patton - "Tremble Hetero Swine" (from Social
postmodernism : beyond identityPolitics / edited by
Linda Nicholson and StevenSeidman New York : Cambridge University
Press, 1995) challenges this distinction.

It should be obvious
to anyone spending time in Oak Park that the majority of gays
there do not support the "in-your-face" approach of
the queer theorists. I have never seen a drag queen in public
here and most of the people wihtin the community that I have spoken
to support my assumption that it is a rare occurence. Gays and
Lesbians in Oak Park "blend in" most of the time emerging
only to celebrate themselves as seen in the annual Oak Park Area
Gay and Lesbian Association Gala or when they believe they are
being discriminated against. As most straight people seem to lack
the so-called "gaydar," that is, the ability to discover
the orientation of strangers, gay and lesbian people are more
or less invisible and unlike other minorities can "disappear"
into the mainstream if they so choose.

I have heard the unsubstantiated
rumor, that one of Oak Park's most famous "characters"
from the turn-of-the 19th century and photographic chronicler
of village life was pre-disposed toward boys and sometimes got
into trouble with the police in Austin for prowling the parks
in that community. According to Doug Deuchler, the Warrington
Opera House on Marion street in Oak Park (where the Mar-Lac Banquet
hall is today.) hosted the Grace Haywood Troupe from 1909-1915.
There were several gay men in the troupe who were apparently accepted
by the community. I'm certain the list of closeted folks is quite
long.

The emergence of a large,
public and politically active gay and lesbian community came as
a bit of a surprise to me in that it violated my clichéd
assumptions about Oak Park as too conservative a place to tolerate
gays. In high school I knew one young man who was a homosexual.
He is ridiculed and taunted and, in general, made miserable by
the silly macho boys of the 1950s. I, unfortunately, was one of
them. I have lost track of him and our class reunion rooster has
no current address. It would have been nice to find out what happened
to him. When I conducted a questionnaire survey of the high school
class (class of 1953), two classmates wrote to me about the homophobia
they experienced in high school. I'm certain there were others
who suffered in silence. Apparently I am not alone in making a
mistaken assumption about the number of gay people in Oak Park.
In 1991 John Clark, a former Oak Parker and gay man was quoted
in the Oak Leaves (January 19, 1991) as saying "I
would never have thought any kind of gay and lesbian movement
would start here."

In more recent times there were several businesses owned by lesbians
who did nothing to hide their sexual preference but also did not
flaunt it. "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" has been the norm
for many gay people until recently. Adult women have been able
to form close relationships with other women sometimes even living
together in a so-called "Boston marriages" without raising
any suspicion about their sexual preferences, making it impossible
to determine their sexual preferences. Marie Kuda, an Oak Park
resident and scholar of the gay movement, has raised the possibility
that Grace Hall Hemingway, might have had such a relationship
in a recent article "in "Was Hemingway's
Mother a Lesbian?"Outlines. Given a greater public
awareness of the gay movement, the era of the Boston marriage
is probably over. As Kuda and other historians of gay and lesbian
America uncover the evidence of prominent people who were closeted
gays, I'm certain the history of many places including Oak Park
will have to be rewritten.

The public emergence
of gays and lesbians in Oak Park occurred a little over ten years
ago because of the public debate surrounding the possibility of
the village passing an ordinance giving benefits to the same sex
partners of village employees. As early as 1989, the transformation
of Oak Park into a welcoming place began when the village passed
a non-discrimination ordinance that mentioned sexual preference.
While the benefits ordinance eventually passed in the Village
council, the process caused some people to realize the need for
an organization that represented the rights and interests of gays
and lesbians in Oak Park. A number of gays and lesbians who are
not politically involved before became politized once they realized
how much opposition there was in the village to what they considered
a simple civil rights issue. The Oak Park Area Lesbian and Gay
Association (OPALGA) was the result. Many of its founders, such
as Mel Wilson, Nathan Linsk and Bekah Levin, are still active
today.

Claiming a membership
in the hundreds (according to a Wednesday Journal article
of June 16, 1999, OPALGA is "...one of the largest volunteer
organizations in Oak Park, with over 300 contributing members
and at least 700 on its mailing list."), OPALGAmay be the largest political
and social organization in the village. I attended their Gala
in June, 1999. There was about 380 people in attendance including
several straight folk who were seeking the support of OPALGA for
their political ambitions. One glance at the advertisers in the
Gala program makes it clear that OPALGA is a major force in the
village - economically and politically. At the Gala, OPALGA established
the Carol Zientek Memorial Fund in memory of one of their founders
killed in an automobile accident in 1998. Zientek and her long-term
partner, Carol Goodwin, were owners of the Left Bank Bookstall,
an Oak Park institution for book lovers. Goodwin, a sociologist
by training, was also the author of the 1979 Oak Park Strategy:
Community Control of Racial Change. (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press) which analyzes Oak Park's unique plan for the social
engineering of the integration of African-Americans. The orientation
of OPALGA sets it apart from other Gay and lesbian groups in Chicago.
According to Mel Wilson, one of OPALGA's founding members, "Our
orientation is inclusive and directed at bringing the gays into
the community and have them participate. We don't want to make
a ghetto and we aren't intended to be exclusive." (Wednesday
Journal June 16, 1999).

OPALGA sponsored a Cultural
festival from 1991 to 1996 and has plans to start it up again.
It also sought to counter the anti-gay sentiment in the village
with a 1992 public forum on family values "Families in Exile:
A Failure in Family Values." In that same year, Prism , a
drop-in center for young people was created. Prism was
revitalized during the fall of 1999 with the addition of new volunteers
(Wednesday Journal October 13, 1999) and assistance of
Charna Linsk, an OPRF high school student who has started "A
Place For All, a high school club for gay and lesbian teenagers
(Wednesday Journal, December 8, 1999). As the result of
pressure brought to bear by OPALGA, the local YMCA was denied
some of its public money funding until they instituted a non-discrimination
policy toward same sex families. Finally the election of Joanne
Trapani, an OPALGA member, as a village trustee is a good indication
of the success of the organization in getting the community to
recognize that gays and lesbians are a significant factor in Oak
Park. She was the first lesbian elected to public office in Illinois.

Almost immediately after
its creation, OPALGA became a vocal and effective political force.
In 1989 in a vote of 7 to 0, the village adopted a non-discrimination
clause in hiring and employment and an ordinance that businesses
cannot discriminate. A debate began in the same year over the
high schools' policies toward openly gay employees that ended
in the modification of the school's Human Dignity Policy to include
sexual orientation. In the context of these debates, several Methodist
churches welcomed gays with a public statement in the local newspapers.
The role of the churches in support of the gay and lesbian community
has been and continues to be a crucial one. At least three churches
have openly gay clergy willing to perform commitment ceremonies
(a symbolic wedding because gay marriage is not legal in Illinois).
The Euclid Avenue Methodist Church has a minister, Tracy Smith,
whose title is "Minister of Outreach to the LBGT Community
(Lesbian-Bisexual-Gay-Transgendered). It should be noted that
the Rev. Greg Dell, Methodist minister who was censored by his
church for performing same sex "marriages" was at one
time the pastor of Euclid Methodist in Oak Park. The support for
the gay community among the churches is not total. There is a
continuum from the Metropolitan Community Church which was founded
to serve the LBGT community to the Calvary Memorial Church - the
most active religious organization in opposition to what they
call "the gay agenda." As Oak Park has always been noted
as a deeply religious place, the support or the lack thereof for
the Gay community by organized religion is crucial to understand.
It is not insignificant that according to Ray Johnson, current
OPALGA's co-chair, the oldest establishment church, First United
"...has worked very much with us." (Wednesday Journal
June 16, 1999)

In 1993 OPALGA asked
the village for domestic partnership ordinance. Angelika Kuehn,
one of the founders of Community Response, a volunteer organization
devoted to assisting persons with AIDS in Oak Park, helped draft
the domestic ordinance. While Oak Park did eventually became the
first Illinois municipality and the 14th U.S. municipality to
enact a domestic partnership ordinance in 1998 and the only community
to do so in an election, the acrimonious debate that ensued during
the five years of public discussion politicized many gays and
lesbians and galvanized Oak Parkers with the anti-gay sentiment.
As same sex marriage is not legal in Illinois, the ordinance was
symbolic but nonetheless the support and opposition was sufficiently
strong as to test the character of the village in terms of the
limits of acceptable diversity. The opposition to ordinances such
as the extension of benefits to same sex partners and to the domestic
partnership ordinances has been most vocal from the Calvary Memorial
church and a group of politically conservative Oak Parkers. During
the public debate, Thirteen church leaders endorsed the registry
in a letter published in the local newspapers. The clergy men
and women said the "central issue underlying the debate is
whether we as a community will respect and support them in their
diversity -- or, alternatively, undermine those homes and families
that do not fit certain narrow specifications." While a number
of churches opposed the registry only people from Calvary Memorial
Church were active and public in their opposition. (See Rev. Pritchard's
1989 sermon "What
the Bible Says about Homosexuality" .for details). The
argument about whether Christianity forbids homosexuality and
whether or not the Bible clearly opposes same sex relations seems
complicated to me since the Metropolitan
Christian Church (MCC) cites scripture in support of homosexuals
sand Rev. Bradley Michelson, pastor of the Oak Park MCC has written
a pamphlet "What Does the Bible Say about Homosexuality?"
as a refutation of Pritchard's sermon. However strongly felt the
opposition to gay rights may be in Oak Park, it has never reached
to depths of the rabid homophobia that results eleswhere in gay
bashing and killing, overt discrimination in the workplace and
in rentals and the real-estate market. The religious objections
to the gay life are complex. A generation or so ago, some fundamentalist
protestants quoted the Bible to support their racism and anti-Semitism.
While it is less common today, one can still find so-called Christians
claiming that integration is against God's plan for humanity.
Some gays I know have suggested that it is possible that the opposition
to gays that comes from Evangelical protestants today who cite
Biblical support for their position might also fade in time.
It is not my place to comment
on or to take sides in this religious argument but instead to
try to understand how these differences impact on the social life
of the village.

Since the ordinance
passed, over thirty couples have registered. Some people feel
that while it may not be legally binding it is nonetheless symbolically
significant. "'Registering has been a very affirming experience
for both Jill and I' says Pam Freese, partner of Jill Allread
and mom's to a beautiful son Jared, 'the certificate is up in
our bedroom, reminding us daily of our commitment to one another,
and about the splendor of excitement we felt the day we 'officially'
made a pledge to one another about how we wanted to live the rest
of our lives. Many of our friends who do not live in Oak Park
comment upon how lucky we are to have this option. It is one of
the many reasons why we love this community and have chosen to
make it the home for our family.'" (OPALGA Bulletin
Summer 1999, pages 1 and 6.).

Some opposition to the
registry came from an anonymous "Concerned Citizens"
committee that sent flyers to many people in Oak Park denouncing
the registry as "unfair" and suggesting it would cause
"irreparable harm to the community." Once the referendum
was passed, the committee disappeared but the emergence of a conservative
movement that might revitalize the local GOP and challenge the
liberal reputation of Oak Park and the hegemony of the Village
Managers Association in local elections was a more permanent consequence
of the battle over benefits and the registry. The disagreement
between the gay community and the conservatives mirrors a national
battle. Gays and lesbians view the issues as those of civil rights.
They feel that discrimination against people because of their
sexual preference should be illegal and the same sex partnerships
should have the legal status of marriage. Further they wish the
schools to stop teaching that same sex relationships are wrong
and that instead to suggest that they represent an alternative
to heterosexuality that some people choose. The conservatives,
on the other hand, believe that the issues are moral ones. Homosexuality
is a sin against God. It is likened to drug addiction and alcoholism.
They believe that to "normalize" homosexuality is tantamount
to saying that it is not a sin. Conservatives see any attempt
to pass anti-discrimination laws or legalizing gay marriage or
proposals to include discussions of homosexuality as a normal
alternative to heterosexuality as part of what they call "the
gay agenda" and strongly oppose it on moral grounds. They
believe gays and lesbians will recruit young people into the lifestyle
if they are given the chance. There is also the mistaken notion
that men who are child molesters tend to be gay. The opposite
is actually the case - abusers are overwhleming hetrosexual. It
is not a civil rights issue for tthe conservatives. As they believe
homosexuality is not biologically determined, they assume gays
have "chosen" their sexual orientation and could, if
they decided, easily become heterosexuals.

The differences between
gays and lesbians and conservatives seem insurmountable. The battles
over benefits and the registry were as acrimonious as could be
found in recent history in the village. But some conservatives
like Mike Nevins feel that these two groups can live together
successfully. In an October 27, 1999 Wednesday Journal
article (page 30) about the registry Nevins "...says he doesn't
sense any rancor in the aftermath...since then (everyone) has
settled into 'live and let live.' 'I'm not aware of any bad blood."
Nevins said." Some members of the gay community I interviewed
are still very angry at the "perceived" hastiness of
the conservatives. This is a battle that is not over, here in
Oak Park or nationally. I am most interested in whether these
apparently unreconcilable differences will make it impossible
for gays and conservatives to live together in a constructive
manner. Because of the public reputation of Oak Park as a liberal
haven, the conservatives feel themselves to be the invisible minority
when it comes to battling the gay agenda. Is being a citizen of
Oak Park more important than these political and religious differences?
In most of the U.S. these groups simply square off to do battle
and make no attempt to find a way to live together. Perhaps the
question is a naive one. As a colleague has suggested to me, can
African-Americans and racists live in harmony or Jews and anti-semites?
Of course not they cannot and never will. Then why would anyone
think that gays and lesbians and conservatives who view the gay
and lesbian life as morally wrong work together for common goals
in the village? I believe that Oak Park may be one of the few
places where this question can be explored.

One further example
of the position of the gay and lesbian community in Oak Park is
the emergence in 1994 of a branch of the Metropolitan Community
Church of the Incarnation (MCC), an organization devoted to the
spiritual needs of gays and lesbians. In a September 21, 1994
Oak Leaves article, Rev. Bradley Mickelson, pastor of the
church, claimed that Oak Park was selected because it has the
highest number of gays and lesbians in the Chicago suburbs. He
estimates about 8,100. Within the MCC congregation are gays who
are a bit more militant than some in Oak Park. Shortly after the
founding of the church (Wednesday Journal November 16,
1999) Mickelson along with other religious leaders lead a demonstration
against the Calvary Memorial Church's proposed "Overcoming
Homosexuality" a forum devoted to saving homosexuals from
themselves, even though the forum had been cancelled prior to
the demonstration. More recently Windy City Times, July
15, 1999) reported that MCC was host to Mel White, an MCC minister
and former ghost writer for Pat Robertson, in their effort to
organize a response to Exodus International's conference at Wheaton
College. Exodus is a religious program designed to "convert"
gays and lesbians to heterosexuality. The MCC movement is a complex
combination of religious conservatism and radical queerness. When
I attended services there, it reminded me of the Reconstructionist
movement in Judaism.

While Oak Park has been
characterized as a gay/lesbian-friendly community, it is also
a place where homophobia is still in evidence. On October 18,
1999 an anonymous person sent an email from the high school to
the MCC web site threatening to burn down the church and kill
gays and lesbians from the church and in the community in general.
While the threat is unsettling for Oak Parkers who like to think
of their village as tolerant, the reaction by some community members
was swift, strong and positive. The local police and the FBI immediately
responded in an attempt to locate the perpetrator (Wednesday
Journal, November 3, 1999). On November 21, 1999 a Vigil Against
Hate Rally and Candlelight Procession was organized with the assistance
of Susan Bridges, OPRF High School Superintendent and representatives
from OPALGA. It was well attended. In January, 2000 both the MCC
and OPALGA received death threats again this time in the form
of a letter (Wednesday Journal, January 12, 2000). Rev.
Mickelson has requested that the village government take an official
stand against these threats. Such actions seem to confirm the
contention of some gays and lesbians that even in apparently liberal
places like Oak Park there is an underlying homophobia that only
occasionally reaches the surface. It is hard to argue against
that assumption.

In the fall of 1998
and again in 1999 MCC sponsored along with Lesbigay Radio the
Annual Rainbow Cotillion. It is held at the Nineteenth Century
Women's Club. The image of this "staid" Oak Park institution
being the site of an event in which several participants appeared
in drag and same sex partner dancing was the rule and not the
exception is an excellent symbol for the "new" Oak Park
that I am interested in understanding.

So far I have failed
to locate other middle-class liberal "straight" communities
that have a reputation for welcoming gays and lesbians. For example.
while Oak Park was listed among the "gay friendly" small
towns and cites by the web site Planetout.com, the other communities
were not noted for their attempts to become ethnically diverse.
I cannot believe that Oak Park is unique but it may be. The "blending
in" of middle-class socially conventional gay couples is
not unique to Oak Park as this Doonesbury
cartoon suggests. However it is the size of the gay community
and its active public presence that is unusual. The question is
why don't other diverse communities that have a reputation for
being successfully integrated like Shaker Heights, Ohio or University
City, Missouri also have significant gay populations?

Oak Park has became
very attractive to gay and lesbian middle-class couples with children.
They are looking for a place that was tolerant, with good housing
and excellent schools. In short, their needs are very similar
to many straight couples. One gay couple with two children I interviewed
told me that given their busy schedule the only people they had
time to socialize with these days were the parents of children
the same age as their children. Being a parent is an identity
that transcends gender preference. One observer has quipped that
Oak Park may be the "straightest" gay and lesbian community
in the U.S. I have hear numerous straight people espouse the clichéd
assumption that the ideal neighbor is a professional gay couple.
They have "good" taste and lots of capital to improve
their house. Gay homeowners help raise the market value of the
neighborhood. While the cliché annoys some gay and lesbian
people, it seems accurate at least in Oak Park.

My interest in doing
an ethnographic study of gays and lesbians is focused upon these
folks as a test of the limits of diversity in Oak Park. Integration
began in the 1970s as an effort to accommodate, in a constructive
way, African-Americans who wanted to move into the community.
The success of this movement caused a sea change in the character
of the village. It became known as a place tolerant of difference
that actively seeks and welcomes diversity - a "liberal place."
As the advertisement for Joe Langley, a Century 21 Realtor in
Oak Park in Lesbian & Gay Pink Pages for Chicago Area
suggests "Oak Park, So liberal Even our Exit Ramps Turn Left."
(For readers who have not been to Oak Park, the exit ramps off
the Expressway do indeed turn left.) In a recent issue (November
17, 1999) of the "HomeStyle" section of the Chicago
Free Press, a weekly newspaper that targets the Chicago area
gay communities, the lead article was entitled "Pleasantville
- Oak Park: Haven for Diversity, tolerance." Author Kerrie
Kennedy, had many positive things to say about Oak Park as a great
place to live if you are gay. Surrounding the article was several
ads for Oak Park realtors. These realtors have weekly ads in the
Chicago Free Press and other gay and lesbian publications.

Gay and lesbian people
are not visible like African Americans, they blend into the community
except when a gay related political issue such as the registry
emerges or in an act of public celebration like the Gay Pride
Parade or when candidates for office seek their support. Oak Park
is a place that almost naturally lends itself to assimilation.
I have a strong hunch that we will never see a Gay Pride Parade
marching down Lake street. In fact, some gay Oak Parkers find
the Chicago Gay Pride Parade a little too queer for their tastes.
"But even more tasteful folks like Marrow (a mildly flamboyant
participant) did little to win over Robin Shukle of Oak Park.
Every year she comes to the parade with a group of lesbian friends.
Every year she says she will not come again. She was upset at
the sight of some bikini-clad men thrusting their hips to the
beat. Then the Dykes on Bikes roared by. 'What makes the 10 o'clock
news?' she said. 'This sets us back in America. It is fun for
the day, but what does it do to get us same-sex marriage benefits?
What does this do to help us adopt to be foster parents.'"
(Chicago Tribune for Monday, June 28, 1999, Section 2,
page 2)

The gay and lesbian
community in Oak Park is not characteristic of what many people
assume a gay and lesbian community looks like. Oak Park is not
a good place to live if you are gay, single and looking for an
exciting night life or even if you are straight and single and
wish to have your public social life near at hand. Oak Park is
a quiet suburb with little in the way of a night life. There are
two well known gay bars in Forest Park, a neighboring suburb where
Oak Parkers have gone for generations to drink because their community
was dry until the 1970s. There is also a fashion store that caters
to drag queens, transvites and trans-sexuals. I know nothing about
its clientale or place in the local gay and lesbian community.

The question that must arise is how different do you need to be
to have a gay identity? Is being gay only relevant in the bedroom
and when it comes to equal civil rights issues as Bruce Bawer
suggests? This is an issue with no easy answer and one that has
plagued all minority groups since the idea of a melting pot became
questioned. What does it mean to be Jewish, Irish-American, Catholic,
etc. in the U.S.? How assimilated can you be and still retain
your minority identity? (See Barry M. Rubin's Assimilation
and its discontents. New York Books, Random House, 1995).
Identity politics consumes the consciousness of most of us. For
gays it is a matter of overcoming prejudices and unequal laws
but that has been and still is the case for many others. I find
observing and studying how the issues discussed above will play
themselves out in Oak Park to be fascinating especially when most
of the social science studies have concentrated on the single
life in gay "ghettos" like the Castro district in San
Francisco and Greenwich Village in New York city and the construction
of gay and lesbian marraiges and families. The social life of
gay and lesbian couples living in a suburb is a topic unknown
in the literature. It is my plan to continue this exploration
wherever it takes me.